#like the songs aren't necessarily all bad there are good ones in there but....where's the spice

[fictionadventurer]

For all the talk about bad Christian fiction, I've seen several different ways that Christianity can be well-integrated into the story.

The story is about something unrelated to Christianity, but the characters are Christian and their faith affects their outlook and daily life. I recently stumbled across Wormwood Abbey by Christina Baehr, which is a light, fairly forgettable cozy fantasy that happens to do this really well. The story is about a woman who learns that dragons exist around her family's estate, but as the daughter of a rector, she often mentions prayer, sings religious songs, or thinks of Bible verses that relate to things she experiences. The Christianity feels organic to the character, and thus enhances the story rather than distracting from it.

The world is a Christian world where Christian beliefs are shown to be the correct framework through which to view the world. This happens in good Christian fantasy, like Lewis and Tolkien, but there are plenty of real-world stories where the themes line up with Christian truths, and this can make a story Christian whether or not religion is explicitly practiced by characters within the story.

The characters wrestle with how to apply their faith in their daily lives. Regina Doman's Fairy Tale Novels often feature this, as the characters struggle to deal with plot problems while living out their faith. Amy Lynn Green's work often features this as well--characters hold certain values (like, for instance, a Quaker pacifist) and have to figure out how they apply or don't apply to specific situations, especially when they conflict with other values, or they have to figure out how to live out their values (such as forgiveness) in moments where it seems impossible or even ill-advised. Charlotte Yonge's best works (specifically, what I've read of The Three Brides) do this as well--instead of preaching the one right answer, you have characters trying to figure out what the best answer is as they figure out what's right or wrong in this specific situation.

Characters face the revelation that there's a spiritual world that exists beyond our ordinary world, which can cause terror, but also provide comfort and hope. Elizabeth Goudge's novels often exist in this space, with very internal stories of characters coming to embrace the truths that come with living in a spiritual world. To a lesser extent, I'd say Amanda Dykes' work often fits here, with characters ultimately find comfort and hope from philosophies that line up with Christian truth. In less-cozy works, there's also the possibility of stories where an entirely secular person encounters God and has to figure out what that means for their life.

So our options are Christianity as character, Christianity as setting, Christianity as theme, or Christianity as plot. The ways this is integrated most seamlessly is when Christianity (or the ways they struggle with it) is a vital part of the character, so the plot that arises from it lines up with a Christian worldview. It also works well for the characters to just exist within a world where Christian truths are the way the world works. It doesn't even necessarily require the characters to be explicitly religious. Truth is something that everyone is searching for, and stories that honestly showcase truth or the search for it are going to resonate with a wide audience, even if they aren't Christian themselves.

[sirfrogsworth]

I keep wanting to write the ultimate post on autotune but I just never quite finish. I think there are 3 versions of almost-done autotune posts in my drafts.

So I'm going to leave out the technical and try to simplify my points.

Autotune is not the devil.

It is not good or bad.

It is just a tool.

It can be used well.

It can be used poorly.

And most importantly...

Autotune cannot make you sound good.

In fact, reverb and EQ can do more to make a bad singer sound okay than autotune.

All autotune does is correct pitch.

Singer sings the wrong note.

Autotune shifts that note.

Nothing about that makes you a better-sounding singer. It doesn't change your tone. It doesn't give you more range. It doesn't give you more power or dynamics. It doesn't give you vibrato.

It just makes you... in tune.

I have never heard anyone say of a great singer, "Wow, they are so in tune!" No one cries over a beautiful performance because the singer hit all the right notes.

And I guess if you are wildly out of tune, people might say you are a bad singer, but I would actually say that makes you an *inexperienced* singer. And whether you are good or bad cannot really be determined until the tuning issues are addressed. (Which most of the time is just a matter of training and practice.)

Good singers can sing the wrong note. It happens quite a lot, actually. Especially with material they aren't familiar with yet. In fact, every singer hits wrong notes. Even people with perfect pitch hit the wrong note. They just know immediately when it happens. This is because singing a note is a physical action and if your vocal mechanisms are not warmed up or you have a cold or the temperature is hot or cold, it is impossible to know if you are going to hit the perfect pitch at any given time.

This is why people warm up and rehearse and do scales before actually singing anything.

Autotune's main use is to fix good takes that have a few sour notes. That is what it is used for 95% of the time. Otherwise you are burning through expensive studio time doing take after take until you hit every single note at the perfect pitch. Sometimes a singer will do an AMAZEBALLS version of a take and they hit one sour note and instead of trying to create that lightning-in-a-bottle moment again, they just nudge the one note and save the performance.

You do not notice autotune the vast majority of the time. If it is used properly, autotune artifacts are completely inaudible.

In fact, I would argue that autotune makes inexperienced singers sound worse. That robotic sound you sometimes hear means the singers were very out of tune. The more out of tune you are, the worse autotune sounds. The more in tune you are, the more invisible it is.

There are very few people who are actually tone deaf. Which means everyone can be taught to sing in tune with decent consistency. And so if there is an instance where someone uses a lot of very obvious sounding autotune, it means they weren't interested in practicing. Or that they got tired of doing multiple takes and had better things to do.

And it isn't that they are a *bad* singer necessarily, but they are probably a lazy one.

Now, there is a different discussion about using autotune to "fix" notes that probably don't need to be fixed. Some variation in pitch can be a good thing. It can show emotion and give notes some spicy flavor. Sometimes singers will start out of tune and shift up to the right note. Like a vocal guitar bend. Being perfectly in tune can sound sterile. And sometimes overzealous producers will let their perfectionism get the better of them and make sure every single note is accurate to the cent and it brings a lifeless feel to the song.

When musicians complain about autotune, this is usually what they are talking about. Not some nepo baby with a record deal who couldn't be bothered to practice their song enough to get it mostly in tune when they sing it.

You should only use autotune to fix pitch when a note truly feels wrong. Like, it is so out of tune that it breaks your immersion.

Otherwise, leave it spicy.

[neptunes-sol-angel]

This is going to be different from my other pick a piles. Instead of using cards, I solely channeled these messages with shufflemancy. I loved doing this reading because I've always imagined myself composing music for a movie or at least deciding which songs to use for scenes if I ever got the chance to have a job in that field. While you're thinking of the scenes and how they parallel with what next year could be like for you, definitely give those songs a listen, as if they'll be in the background.

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Pile One 🍿

The Beginning Scene:

Provoker - Dark Angel

(That's a bad ass song for an intro!)

I see a montage of a person (the main character) arriving to a new city that has some sort of cyberpunk aesthetic. The locals aren't very welcoming to this person, but the main character isn't exactly fond of them either. It's dark and gritty despite the showcasing of colors from all sorts of gadgets, lights, and holographic displays. This place is big, with a lot to glimpse at and discover, and crowds of individuals who could potentially be a rival, enemy, lover, or even a friend.

I feel like this pile is going to be starting the new year in a different environment, possibly a new place to call home, but for a lot of you, I'm getting school. For the scene I visualized for you guys, there was this building tension that I kept feeling. Like you guys are not really happy about this new beginning, but you're here at this destination to have a more discreet life with no ties to your past. You guys could feel like a lone ranger, who's lost in life, but isn't necessarily trying to be found or have an obligation to anything. It seems like you're really looking for peace, and aren't trying to make yourself popular amongst people or make connections. I see people sizing you up to intimidate you, but they aren't aware that you aren't the one to mess with, they will though. I also see you being active in this new environment, and people boasting about how helpful and talented you are, but you aren't accepting these compliments. You guys could be dealing with an ego death at the beginning of this year and are having trouble seeing the good that people see in you, whether they're genuine people or foes. Its like you're trying to keep yourself in the dark of this new place, despite running away from your past, and this year is throwing a lot of intervention in your way to bring you out of this self-loathing mindset and to stop running away from fate.

The Middle Scene:

SWANES - Cozy

I see the main character attending a nightclub party, and the appropriate attire for entry is masquerade themed. The main character is looking for someone or something but unexpectedly encounters someone else. Someone from their past, but before they could really catch up with each other, a fight breaks out.

I'm seeing this as a lot of chaotic events that you'll have to deal with in the middle of the year to the point where it's hard for you to focus on anything or anyone else, besides a way to end all of the drama that keeps unfolding. It's like in the middle of this storm, you feel like this is its peak, but then you come across someone from the past that you absolutely don't have time for or want to be bothered by or finding a new love interest that brings you both joy and stress because it all feels like the wrong time to have them. For a lot of you, I feel like this reconciliation with someone you've either dated or never got the chance to but definitely had strong feelings for. But then again, this could really mean, finally finding someone that understands you on an intimate level in this new place that you're in, or allowing yourself to put your guard down and and be in the embrace of someone who will give you comfort for being yourself, instead of giving you more reasons to not like yourself.

The Ending Scene:

Naja Young - Brighter Days

A bittersweet sight to see. For the first time in the movie, in sadly the last scene, the main character stands in front of a golden‐amber sky instead of the clouded and dull atmosphere that they were used to seeing in the city. There's no one else around them, only them, but they're finally content and at peace, with a welcoming smile, staring out in the open, but no long moving. No longer walking or running away from anything.

The genre that I felt for this movie was action. A lot of jaw-dropping fight scenes, and cool neon futuristic weapons and stuff. So I'm getting that the year could feel like endless fighting for you guys, even if you guys are winning, there's still this exhaustion with even having to fight still. This could symbolize being tired of not fitting in with a community but could also symbolize not understanding why you can't fit in with yourself. The Scene doesn't include anyone else, because it represents the main character (you), finally ending this battle that they have within, moreover, finding and attaining peace with themselves that didn't include what they did for other people or what other people did to them. The thing about action movies is that they tend to rank lower than other genres because the fights water down the plot, so I think this means that you're still not really attached to finding or working towards your purpose this year, or even the potential drama with other people in the future, you're OK with where you are now and aren't concerned about anything other than what makes you happy. So regardless of the pain you've experienced in the past, recently, or will experience, in the future, this year will teach you how to not let it consume you or keep you in a panic of how to survive rather than how to live.

The Grammy Award Winning Scene:

Family Time - Magic Abyss Hotel

I'm seeing this fight Scene where it looks like you're losing and about to be killed, but you're smiling and chuckling? The person fighting you is confused, and that creates an opening for you. It's your rhythm while you're fighting that makes this scene the star of the movie, it's like your fighting is almost like dancing with the way it syncs with the song.

This could represent a tower moment that could feel like an inevitable end for you or maybe something that could potentially put you at rock bottom, and it just feels unbelievable. So you laugh because this isn't how you envisioned your end to be, but I feel like the irony of it gives you strength to keep pushing and know that it's not over for you and you won't go out from what you're currently facing. The main character (you) creates visual of what's familiar to everyone which is resilience, but also an inspiration of what triggers a person to keep fighting for their life.

Pile Two 🍿

The Beginning Scene:

Winter - Bonsai

I see the main character being a famous musician in a band performing in front of a huge crowd of people. They're really feeling what they're singing and playing on their instrument that you would think it's real, but it's not. This is a dream. They know that though. It's an awesome dream that they have most of their nights of sleeping, it's just painful when they have to wake up. But they wake up, and then they carry on with with their normal life that isn't as colorful and exciting as the dream that they were in.

I feel like at the beginning of the new year, you will feel like it's any other year, where it's the same stuff and you are no longer expecting anything to change or get better. This could make your attitude appear very nonchalant, but inside you're actually angry over how can reality be so monotonous. As you're reading this, you probably won't believe my word, but I have a feeling that this year could actually be the one where you experience a different tune, something life changing, but only this time, will there be positive transformations. I must add though, that this doesn't mean you won't face anything bad or that the year will be 100% good, but I do see improvement that will make you pleased. If you guys are maladaptive dreamers, you could experience a lot of deja vu in the beginning of the year. Where the opportunities and people that you meet aren't as exaggerated like in the scenarios that you imagine, they will still scarily resemble too much of the things that you wished for or dreamed of experiencing. The start of your year, could be the opposite of boredom that you were expecting. It will start off eventful, that could be overwhelming to keep up with, but I feel like it will only be the tip of the ice berg. Momentum for something exciting that'll give you that new start you were craving, but most importantly, real.

The Middle Scene:

Saskatchewan - Venom

I see someone in front of a computer, looking for answers, but are heavily frustrated with what they can't find. I see them moving onto books and old articles, but still they can't find anything. Then I see them in front of a mirror, with tears falling down their face. They're just not sure about something anymore. I see a scene of this person trying on makeup that changes their looks drastically, but it doesn't satisfy them, so they immediately wipe it off. I see another scene of them shaving their head, but it's the same result. Another, where they're getting a piercing, but no luck. Last, a scene where they get a tattoo, but futile. And then, the person is back in front of their mirror, eyes red from crying, and then they grab something to shatter the mirror with.

There could be something about your existence that's bothering you. This feels like imposter syndrome, or not quite figuring out what's dragging you down and making you feel like there's something missing. Or maybe you'll come across some new information about yourself or your family that you weren't expecting, that shatters who you've always known yourself to be. Maybe you're haunting yourself with things from the past that make you overthink about where you fit in with people or what about you just doesn't resonate with people anymore. Maybe you're losing friends or even broke up with someone, but this seems a lot about blaming yourself for what you've lost, or why you don't feel cut out for a project or role thag you were chosen for. This could also symbolize stress over school or work, where you question if you're good enough for something or if signs are showing you to change your route. I definitely see you recovering from this phase of uncertainty, but for a lot of you, the solution is to move on to something else that makes you more sure of yourself without any pressure, or away from people that discourage you about your dreams because of an unconventional calling or path that you're on.

The Ending Scene:

The Macho Ache - How Did I Get Here

I see the main character (you) in their own place, somewhere that they're proud to call home. The place is cluttered with beautiful Christmas decorations. There's this huge window with a beautiful view of a city, probably somewhere that they've always wanted to live in. They're dancing in front of that window, in front of that skylight view, with stars in the background, twinkling just like the main character who has now finally become their own star in reality, not a dream.

I see success. Success that the main character (you) wasn't expecting, that feels like night and day compared to last year. They are happy. You are happy. You're overwhelmed with how much your life has changed but it's different from the kind that you were experiencing earlier in the year, this feels like like relief that didn't seem possible.

The Grammy Award Winning Scene:

Surf Curse - Labyrinth

I see the main character driving with an adrenaline rush that's emphasized in their eyes. They've had enough and are madly driving driving away from people. This could be from a job that they've quit, their parents, a friend or group of friends, or a lover. The main character is slowly breaking down crying as they're still driving away, but eventually they start crying happy tears.

This Scene represents the pain and grief after someone makes a decision that they didn't want to make but feel as if they needed to. The Scene represents regret after walking alway from someone that they've known for the longest but can no longer handle anymore hurt from them. The sad tears could represent their life flashing in their mind with these individuals, both happy and sad memories, and this pulling feeling that wants them to stay because it's familiar, but the happy tears symbolize that what's done is done, and the joy from their emancipation.

Pile Three 🍿

The Beginning Scene:

Ordinary Child - Float On

I see the main character in an aftermath of the world as we knew it, destroyed. They're the last human. They're laying down on what's left of a rooftop, staring up in a daze, at the sky filled with aurora lights.

At the very beginning of this year, you could be fearful of what's to come because you're still processing all that has happened to you in 2022. For you, you just don't feel right about this year, as if the world is ending, so you could be disassociating a lot. Or maybe you're confused about your surroundings. How people can still go off living their lives when there's so much going on in the world, so it's like you're anticipating something and you're just wondering when other people will catch up. You could be internalizing too much of the world's pain, so I'm seeing that there could be lessons brought to you on how to place boundaries with how much you're feeling from other people and situations, but reminders to stop moving so fast trying to find out how everything is going to end, because you have a life that still needs to be lived now. Maybe you're also being nudged with experiences that bring you back to appreciating what life has to offer now, but it doesn't move you completely. It seems like you'll feel like a ghost. Nothing makes you feel much anymore or everything around you just doesn't feel real.

The Middle Scene:

Easy Life - Wet Weekend

I'm seeing the main character encountering an alien that arrived on earth as a new home. They're just as confused as the main character, but the main character puts their guard down, and shows the alien around earth despite what has been destroyed.

I'm picking up that you could be around younger individuals. There's a baby, child, or someone that's around your age who's naive that you'll meet and be around a lot. Somehow, you're both learning a lot from each other, but most importantly, this is making you regain your humanity or at least faith in humanity. Because I was getting maybe a baby or child, they could represent a newfound perspectives and appreciation for living, and allowing yourself to recieve and give. This could also mean using your knowledge and awareness to find inspiration for a new lifestyle or philosophy. There's something about your beliefs changing a lot in this part of your year, where you're no longer obsessing over other people's enlightenment or lack thereof, but focusing on how there's still much to learn than just concluding that the point in life is to die and that's it. You could also find newer communities to be in, that will put you at ease, and make you have more fun.

The Ending Scene:

Slchild - Maybe We Need a Break

After separating from your alien friend due to an argument or one of you guys being captured. You guys are reunited again, and are walking together with your shadows signifying the strength of your friendship.

For some reason, I feel like this represents feeling like yourself again. Like no longer feeling outside of your body with no confusion over your life and why things happen the way that they do. You're feeling very whole even amongst the people that you couldn't understand before. I'm getting that you're also no longer caring about your pace by realizing that we all move at different tempos. This could also mean no longer feeling like the world is out to get you, and there are other people who share similar traumas that you've faced, despite what they look like on the outside. I also interpret this as creating something that substantial that surpasses time and death. This can be finding new friends and "family" and making memories with you that they will always remember and keep close, or this could represent strong progress in healing through grief that you've been experiencing with a loved one that died. People may not live forever, or happiness may not be a constant thing, but you're learning how to immortalize things that you love about living or that you loved about someone who passed away.

The Grammy Award Winning Scene:

VACATIONS - Steady

The main character (you) is scavenging through old remnants and belongings of people that didn't survive the apocalypse. They're mourning over both people that they've known and haven't even met.

I feel like grief is a big message in this pile. Grieving through your loss for wanting to life, grieving through dreams you may have missed out on, grieving through people that you've lost to death or other reasons. This is a powerful scene for the audience that knows what it's like to have feelings of emptiness and no idea left on where to go. I feel like if this pile is going through a loss, please know that you will get through this, even if it feels endless. I feel like the year of 2023, will evoke the recovery that you need to find your way back into the world again.

[tehamelie]

Various fine opinions on the meaning of life contained in Monty Python's The Meaning of Life:

*Unionize your workplace, alternatively turn it into a pirate ship and take to the high seas. It'll piss off management either way.

*Question everything.

*Look at what you think you know from a different perspective.

*The pursuit of profit at all costs can and will ruin the meaning of any work and also make you worse at it.

*Gender roles are not necessarily assigned at birth.

*The Catholic church is not well.

"God has blessed us so much I can't afford to feed you all any longer."

*Just because you're allowed doesn't mean you should.

*You should not, and will not, die to "keep China British."

*God has many ways to cook you to death, if He wants to.

*Straight sex is so damn boring.

*Don't just stampede towards the clitoris, Watson.

*Sport, like sex, only works between equal parties. Any other way and you invite horror and depravity. (That kid is definitely dead and the upperclassmen are just stomping on him anyway.)

*Actually, getting murdered playing rugby against adults two or three times your size is an excellent way to prepare you for fighting in a war.

*Even a good captain will be hated by their subordinates. This is the burden of command.

"We'll always need an army, and may God strike me down were it to be otherwise." *is immediately struck down by literal the hand of God*

*A fighting force is better served by a single soldier who actually wants to be there than twenty men who doesn't.

*There's a fine line between keeping one's cool in a heated situation and acting like you're on a bloody different planet when people are dying in front of you.

There are less than 4500 wild tigers left in the world. The "A tiger? In Africa?!" bit is less of a joke every year.

*In less than surprising news, killing people is bad for you. (It turns out, for psychologically healthy people, doing violence really hurts you as much as the victim.)

*Where is that fish?

*Theme restaurants could do with a bit of randomly mixed themes.

*Don't be afraid to ask the most idiotic questions about things you don't understand. That's how we learn.

*Oh ho it's the meaning of liver donation I get it now.

*The Galaxy Song is fun and all but don't give in to misanthropy.

*Matter is energy, the human soul grows with care and attention, and people aren't wearing enough hats.

*Actually, the movie makes a staggering point here and buries it with distracting nonsense jokes, while also making the point that we get sidetracked from self-actualization by distracting nonsense jokes. It's a point sandwich with joke filling.

Isn't it awfully nice to have a penis? Shout out to happy penis havers, though I'm not one myself.

*M Creosote shows us that single-minded devotion to one's mission in life (eating an entire upscale French restaurant in one sitting, for example) will leave you unhappy and alone.

*Dunk antisemites in buckets of vomit.

*Gaston, the middle aged waiter, delivers a coherent personal philosophy as he walks us to the cottage where he was born. The significance of this cannot be overestimated. He decided to be a waiter, you see. Because he believes in something. It's a simple belief of giving, of loving people and bringing them joy. But be believes it with all his heart and he'll fight for the right to live the life he chose.

*If you have to die, but can choose the manner of your execution, try being hounded to death by naked women.

*See the world in a grain of sand, or a maple leaf as it were.

*Terry Pratchett was a great man and a great writer, but he's wrong about one thing: Death is relative. No, no, you can't argue away Death or shoot him, but he is subject to the laws of relativity. Consider the stars in the sky; at least one star that's visible to the naked eye I hear may be dead right now - it's 500 light years away and they think it may go supernova at any point within 500 years from now. But here, locally, the star still lives; there's no possible reality where it's gone until the light of its explosion reaches us.

*Heaven is a fantastically cheesy musical theater performance with angel santa claus strippers and a lead singer you just want to punch. Clearly we need to build something better here on Earth.

*Be nice, read books, take a walk sometimes, and try to live together in peace and harmony with people of all creeds and nations. Obviously.

*[The producers] hope that other fish will follow [the example of the movie] so that, in future, fish all over the world will live together in harmony and understanding, and put aside their petty differences, stop hunting and eating each other and live for a brighter, better future for all fish and those who love them. Yes, clearly this is about fish.

[edrxl]

so it's common in bsd fandom that "hall and outes - out of touch" is sskk theme song and i wanted to dig deeper into the meaning of the song and how it may correlate with sskk

as a warning: english isn't my first language so don't expect excellent grammar there, don't be harsh with me thank you. let's begin:

«shake it up is all that we know; using the bodies up as we go; i'm waking up to fantasy» – both atsushi and akutagawa grew up in an unhealthy environment so "shaking" out of anger and hunger (atsushi) or out of fear of an authority (akutagawa) is "all that they know". akutagawa "walks up to fantasy", by "fantasy" meaning that dazai would have recognized him if akutagawa was "strong" enough

«the shades all around aren't the colors we used to see» – both akutagawa and atsushi seeing new shades when they're recruited to their organization. atsushi seeing unusual "colors" after being kicked out of an orphanage where he was abused to ada; akutagawa seeing his previous "shades" from life in the slums flew away after he joined the pm, instead , new ones fall into that place (though they didn't necessarily got brighter)

«broken ice still melts in the sun» – akutagawa as "broken ice" and atsushi as the "sun". like how akutagawa stopped killing because of his promise to atsushi or how his worldview got challenged by atsu (and the other way around)

«and times that are broken can often be one again» – they're both broken: by dazai or the orphanage director yet with the help of another they heal. for example in the battle on the ship, akutagawa uses another piece of clothing besides coat dazai gave him, showing that saving atsushi was his own decision; atsushi is gradually getting rid of his "good victim, bad victim" mentality, which was a response to the trauma of abuse

«we're soul alone; and soul really matters to me» – self-explanatory. both of them looks at what's inside rather than the appearance and/or how people positions themselves to be (akutagawa with fukuchi, atsushi, partially kyouka; atsushi with kyouka, lucy, dazai, partially akutagawa). and both form a "soul alone"

«take a look around; you're out of touch; i'm out of time» – also self-explanatory. akutagawa is out of atsushi's range due to vampirism; akutagawa is out of time because of his lung disease

«but i'm out of my head when you're not around» – atsushi hallucinating akutagawa after his death

«reaching out for something to hold; looking for a love where the climate is cold» – as i said earlier, both akutagawa and atsushi grew in destructive conditions and seeks for recognition, warmth and love. the 2nd line could be interpreted as akutagawa searching for a love in the port mafia – where the climate is cold

«manic moves and drowsy dreams; or living in the middle between the two extremes» – akutagawa's yearning for recognition could be described as "manic" and a "drowsy dream", same as atsushi's craving for a "proof" that he's worthy to live. port mafia and armed detective agency are "two extremes" between whom they both live in.

«smoking guns hot to the touch; would cool down if we didn't use them so much, yeah» – the term "smoking guns" is often used metaphorically to refer to clear evidence or proof of wrongdoing or a crime. in context of sskk i'd say it means them "hating" each other and constantly refusing to acknowledge/properly cooperate with one another. this situation "would cool down" if they "didn't use" their hatred so much and perhaps they could even empathize and understand each other

in conclusion: i hate conclusions. sskk gay and "out of touch" is their song. yeah.

[lost-inanotherlife]

"I Do" or when Kate and Jack almost got (figuratively) married

I've previously stated that I don't find "I Do" particularly excellent when it comes to Kate's flashback story. I still stand by that. From a creative point of view Kate reiventing herself as Monica and getting married to a police officer doesn't exactly scream "genius". Conversely, the idea for her flashback in "Left Behind" is way more compelling and allows us to see sides of Kate that aren't necessarily related to her interior romantic love life (in that episode Kate and Cassidy teams up to "con" Kate's mother in order for Kate to have a moment with her without getting arrested).

Having said that, "I Do" is, overall, a fucking great episode. Everything and I mean EVERYTHING is written and shot to perfection so I thought to write a little meta about it.

Now, before we move on to the analysis, let's please consider that the previous Kate-centric episode is S2E9 "What Kate Did". I wrote an extensive meta about it and you can find it here. For the sake of this meta, though, all you need to know is this: what Kate sees in Sawyer is herself, specifically what she thinks she is in the present moment based on the things she's done in the past, i.e. a "bad" person or a person capable of doing "bad" things; what Kate sees in Jack is her potential self, what she thinks she can become in the present moment and simply be in the future because she intimately thinks she's capable of being "good" and doing "good" things.

In "What Kate Did" she chooses the black horse representing her "dark" self, therefore she chooses Sawyer. In "I Do" she symbolically chooses Sawyer again but things get a litte bit more complicated because this time Jack says his "I do" and Kate finds that she can't quite say "I do" back yet, but she can't say goodbye to her potential either: in other words she can't leave Jack/her potential behind. You'll see what I mean in this meta.

ACT ONE.

The episode opens with the song "Slowly" in the background. We hear the following lyrics:

Tell me you love me again but this time slowly 'Cause you're talkin' too fast, baby, much fast Come on and squeeze me again but this time slowly 'Cause I like your grasp but it's much fast

You said that our love will grow together 'Cause your mine all mine

Foreshadowing: this episode will be about "I love yous" and about something that's growing.

It'll also be about make-believe as we see a 50s-styled Kate opening a box containing a wedding veil. A man knocks on her door and we see the following dialogue:

MAN: Police, open the door. KATE: [Nervously] Um. Everything's alright in here. MAN: Ma'am, we have reason to believe that someone extremely dangerous is in the motel. We're conducting a room-to-room search. KATE: [Starting to smile] I'm alone, officer. MAN: The person could be holding you at gunpoint, forcing you to say that. Please open the door. KATE: I don't think I should. MAN: Then you have three seconds before I break this door down. One... two... [Kate stands by and opens the door right before he says "three", revealing the policeman, Kevin.] KEVIN: Hey. Wanna get it on? dialogue from https://lostpedia.fandom.com

We the audience (who already know about Kate's past) are already tipped off to the fact that this is all fake. Kate is clearly wearing a mask, she's being someone else, someone who perhaps she'd like to be or, at least, she's putting on a new persona-dress to see if it fits. Spoiler alert: it doesn't. However, this is also extraordinarily real because Kate's indeed a fugitive, she might as well be "the dangerous someone in the motel" herself. Ironically, in the scenario where Kate is the dangerous person in the motel, she's also the person who's holding at gunpoint... herself, forcing herself to say stuff. Interesting, right? In other words, the show is telling us to pay close attention because the episode will play with the line between fiction and reality.

In the very second scene there's a defeated Sawyer throwing rocks without purpose. Kate sees something's wrong with him, he's slowly giving up. She tells him to get a fish biscuit for her, implicitly telling him: "Provide for me, be here for me, don't give up". Sawyer's not stupid and immediately retorts with a "Psh. What, you trying to keep me feeling productive?".

In the last scene of Act 1, we're introduced to the final protagonist of this episode, Jack, and we discover what's growing as the song alluded in the very first scene: "JACK: [To Ben] The tumor on your spine is borderline inoperable. And at the rate it's growing, that borderline goes away in about one week".

By the end of Act 1 we have all the info we need to understand this episode: it'll be about love, it's gonna make us believe things that are not true and the thing that's growing on Ben's spine will be the keystone to put all the pieces of the puzzle together.

To be continued!

[curejiraiya]

So AiPri huh.

I posted my live reactions on Twitter, but tldr of that was I was initially really excited. I think the idea of two arcade games, one that's more aimed children and one that's more aimed at long time fans is honestly genius. I think that they're going to make a lot of money out of that concept.

I also compared it a lot to Aikatsu. The art looks like Aikatsu, the plot that we know feels like Aikatsu. I think the two new main girls are pretty cool, they're designs are a lot simpler than PriMagi and I can't say I like that, but I don't dislike their designs I just like them less than PriMagi.

I'm also really excited for the music. I honestly feel like I called Auru's VA being the lead, but she deserves the role. She's really young and if this show stays around she'll grow into it. We didn't hear much but I liked the song we heard from the snippit of the arcade game, even a little more than Matsuri's song.

Though once the live stream ended my excitement has dropped a little bit. The anime is being done by a completely different production company, that means it's not going to keep a lot of its staff. To be blunt the writing is just going to be different, and I'm scared it's going to be more like the modern children's anime landscape where they're afraid to have things happen lmfao. They don't get deep enough into the plot as I want, and they leave all the crazy world building to the last few episodes. Now PriChan did this too so like there was a chance this was gonna happen anyway, but giving the show to a studio that's known for working on fucking pokémon terrifies me a little bit. I'm scared it's going to be shallow and bad.

Actually I think I'm just scared It's going to be Aikatsu. Aikatsu isn't a bad show, but it's not the Pretty Series. There isn't crazy lore and things that you could never expect to happen happening. The Pretty Series has a certain magic that I haven't felt in any other show, and I'm worried a new production team isn't going to be able to capture that.

The other two parts of my theory that lead me to believe this is true is 1. the split arcade game, because the arcade game that's meant more for adults has the old series girls on the front of the machine. Like it's being very blunt that it's pushing nostalgia, and the show itself isn't. I'm worried that their intentionally dividing the audiences so they can aim the show at a slightly lower demographic and not alienate the adults. and then 2. The theme of the show being makeup. Makeup itself is not inherently childish, but two-fold one it makes the show pointedly more for girls than unisex, which also is not a problem I just think the only reason they would do that is if they want to capture a very young child audience.

But the other point and this to me is the important one, is children's makeup toys in Japan are made to be temporary because the students are not allowed to wear makeup to school. So they have formulas meant for the kids to be able to rub off easily in their lip gloss and nail polishes. Because of this adults cannot buy these toys, because they're not going to wear fucking temporary lip gloss. It concerns me slightly that their main toy line with this series is something that adults aren't going to want at all. In comparison to something like prepara where the main toys are little plastic mics which make great display pieces for adults. Fun for all ages.

Now; lowering the target demographic age of the show doesn't necessarily mean a bad show, But I can't help but look at other shows airing for the demographic like PreCure or Aikatsu or even pokémon and as an adult viewer you can see that the shows have been slightly dumbed down then where they were when they started airing. or even where they were when Pretty Rhythm started airing. and it's my personal opinion that I don't really like these new shows that much, they're not bad but they're not as good as they used to be lmaooooo and it's not nostalgia because I didn't grow up with PreCure or Pretty.

That's the crux of my fears though, like I'm just afraid new production company, new people who haven't touched the show before, they're going to dumb it down. But we don't know yet.

Someone on Twitter pointed out that this opens up the production company to work on projects like PolePri or hahahaha omg say it with me, King of Prism 🤡 but I do like those kinds of shows that they've put out, and they seem to he pushing cheer screenings, so this could lead to good things in the end.

Sorry if this is slightly gloomy, I'm still excited! I'm just cautious.

[1moremilgram-enjoyer]

Amane T1 Cover - Positive Parade

Been a while, but we're back to covers! Time for the specialest girl ever, Amane and Positive Parade! I miss her sounding as happy as she does in this song, man. At least she seemed to be having fun in parts of Purge March too, but that was a different kinda fun. Anyways, let's go!

CW Cults and indoctrination, child abuse

Positive Parade is possibly the one covered song in Trial 1 with no explicit references to romance or sex, which in my eyes is a win for Amane, common best character w.

What also makes this song stand out is just how happy it is! It actually is an extremely optimistic and uplifting song, where the singer encourages someone else to follow their dreams and remain positive in the face of adversity.

Stuff your heart full with all your dearest dreams Go for broke on all the things you wanna do! “We can’t stop” Is this a good feeling? Or is it no good after all? On these never-ending nights, let's talk while dancing with the stars Even when times are tough, the light is always by our sides “We can’t stop” You’ll turn out okay! Because you'll find your smile fits you perfectly

(I'm using this translation because the translation in the Milgram wiki has very odd wording at times, so I think it kinda confuses the meaning a bit)

The 'never-ending nights' I believe represent the struggles of life, which at times feel endless. But the singer suggest to talk while 'dancing with the stars', while engaging with the light in the darkness. "Even when times are tough, the light [of the stars] is always by our sides." Optimism! Happiness!

There is the "is this a good feeling? or is it no good after all?" line which seems like it could imply some lurking horror, but there's a few ways to read that. I actually think the singer is asking if the person being sung to is happy with what they're doing, or if they should stop and move on to something else, which is similar to this line:

This isn’t enough, not yet I need to make sure I don’t mess up the words I want to say “I forbid you from pushing yourself too hard" "I’ll be right here” So you won't be discouraged by what comes tomorrow, if we could laugh together again... That's why you gotta stop those "what'll happen if"s!

The singer wants the other to make sure not to push themselves too hard, and reassures them they can rely on the singer.

The important part there is that the singer wants to be relied on. Not in like a dangerous way necessarily, just a "I'm your friend and I want to help you when you're down" kinda way. At least that's the vibe I get.

Heeeey, aren't you straight up bawling your eyes out? It's not normal for you to pretend that everything's fine. Even though you've got things you want to say Where's that sadness you've been shouldering? Come on, one day it'll just overflow "I'm sorry, I can't do it anymore, please help me" You don't want to imagine it, You don't want to hear it, do you? So before it comes to that, rely on me!

You know, I've seen people say that some people think this song is about toxic positivity, but to me it doesn't really look like it. The singer's literally telling the other that if they hide their pain, it's gonna overflow and that's bad. That's, like, the opposite of toxic positivity. And "you" don't want to hear yourself saying "I can't do it anymore, please help me", right? Just rely on the singer now before it gets too bad!

I guess you could say that sounds like a savior complex, which is definitely a way to read the song:

If someone tells you you're wrong, Even when you're not wrong at all I won't support anything that denies you You can take the opportunity to hold me close and you can share the burden of your worries with me You say it's embarrasing, but I'm embarrased too, you know! Don't laugh and say this isn't like me, It's my answer to meeting you. Rely on me, rely on me, please

Yeah, the "rely on me, rely on me, please" certainly feels a bit too desperate.

However, I still feel it can be read more charitably. Listen, this song was written as a theme song for a collaboration with a theme park named Yomiuri Land (Source, it's in Japanese but Google translate gives you the idea). There doesn't need to be a hidden horror here. While again, it's perfectly fine if you read it as a savior complex or something else, I personally see it as completely innocent positivity.

The line about both of them being embarrased by what's going on is very sweet. No big meaning there, I just like it.

So the singer either does or doesn't have a savior complex; at least they find quite a bit of happiness in helping others. If you're wondering about Miku shedding a tear in the artwork, it's probably a tear of joy from "dancing with the stars." In my personal opinion, there is no hidden horror in this song, it's just a really nice optimism anthem! The only way this would be horrifying at all is if it were being sung by, like, an abused cult victim or something.

... Oh.

Yeah this is where we acknowledge that, even though the original song may not be hiding anything too horrifying, it's being covered by Amane fucking Momose. And nothing this girl does ever fails to make us sad.

So, Amane here has the same "I want to make other people happy" attitude that we see in Magic.

[Magic] Only if, only if, only if I could be a good girl I hope, I hope everyone can be happy and smile Forever, forever together would be a dream

She's even called something akin to "Happiness Support Sister" in the credits. Amane wants everyone to be happy, that's ultimately her goal in everything she does. The thing is that the concept of "happiness" has been so horrendously twisted by her cult that a lot of the time it shows in a very... uh... concerning way.

Timeline 23/01/17 Amane: Happy birthday.Mahiru-san. How is your body feeling? Mahiru: ……ah, Amane-chan. Thank you. Yeah, I’m fine. Now I can move around if I use a wheelchair…… It’s all thanks to Shidou-san looking after me…… Amane: I’ll give you one warning. The two of you are dabbling in something tabooed. If you continue to go against the way of nature like this, you’ll just bring an early death upon yourself. Think hard about this. Mahiru: Amane-chan……? Are you really Amane-chan……?

Like, technically speaking, Amane is trying to make sure Mahiru stays happy. As in, not dead. She does something similar with Fuuta. Notably, she's only shown herself really hostile towards Shidou, who she dislikes for reasons even beyond the whole medicine thing. Long story.

But since this is Trial 1, she's likely not really speaking to anyone in the prison. So, who is Amane talking to? The most straightforward answer is that she's talking to her abusers, more specifically her mother probably. Because they are the "everyone" she's talking about in Magic; Amane thinks that if she can make them happy, she'll stop being punished and thus she'll be happy too.

Of course, this paints the entire song in a horribly grim light. Because now the singer's pleas to be relied on are Amane asking her abusers what she needs to do to make them happy.

You can take the opportunity to hold me close and you can share the burden of your worries with me You say it's embarrasing, but I'm embarrased too, you know!

The "burden" here may very well be the things Amane does """wrong""", so Amane might be asking what she needs to change.

Heeeey, aren't you straight up bawling your eyes out? It's not normal for you to pretend that everything's fine. Even though you've got things you want to say Where's that sadness you've been shouldering? Come on, one day it'll just overflow "I'm sorry, I can't do it anymore, please help me" You don't want to imagine it, You don't want to hear it, do you? So before it comes to that, rely on me!

Question: What do you think happens when "it overflows"? When Amane's abusers are frustrated at something? Not Amane, just anything in general. How do you think that goes? In a lot of cases, chid abusers will find any excuse to """justify""" hurting their child when they're frustrated by literally anything. That means it's very possible Amane now tries to make sure her abusers are happy all the time, because it's the only way she can think of to avoid being hurt.

This isn’t enough, not yet I need to make sure I don’t mess up the words I want to say “I forbid you from pushing yourself too hard" "I’ll be right here” So you won't be discouraged by what comes tomorrow, if we could laugh together again... That's why you gotta stop those "what'll happen if"s!

"I need to make sure I don't mess up the words I want to say" sure reads a lot more sinisterly when "messing up the words" could end up with Amane being seriously hurt.

Yeah like that.

If someone tells you you're wrong, Even when you're not wrong at all I won't support anything that denies you

And this definitely reads like something she'd say about the cult. She won't support anything that denies the cult or their doctrines, you don't have to worry about that! Please don't hurt her.

Stuff your heart full with all your dearest dreams Go for broke on all the things you wanna do! “We can’t stop” Is this a good feeling? Or is it no good after all? On these never-ending nights, let's talk while dancing with the stars Even when times are tough, the light is always by our sides “We can’t stop” You’ll turn out okay! Because you'll find your smile fits you perfectly

The chorus is a bit strange with this reading, since what the "dearest dreams" are is very debatable. It's possible it's just general positivity without referring to anything in particular, but if it is something specific, my best guess would be "following the cult's doctrines and going to [heaven or equivalent]". Apart from that, again, the other stuff is kinda sinister under this reading. "Yeah, focus on the good stuff! Don't worry about the sad things! Please don't get mad! Please please please don't get mad and hurt me!"

But the thing about "chasing the dream" being following the cult's beliefs makes the "we can't stop" line really mortifying. Originally that's just "we shouldn't let our doubts stop us in our dreams!" but now it's "we can't stop following the doctrines because horrible horribe things will happen if we do!"

[The Purge March] If you become a bad girl, monsters will come out This is the magic that stops that from happening

And wanna know a """fun""" little detail? I haven't been paying much attention to differences between the og songs and the covers, but Amane gets special treatment.

I invite you to listen to the "we can't stop" line from around 2:18 - 2:19 minutes into the song both in the original and in Amane's cover. In the Miku version, that's sung pretty much the same as every other time. However, in the Amane cover, it's sung in a noticeably different way. It's hard to describe, because it sounds a mix of exhausted, resigned, depressed, something like that. Think of it like this: if the rest of the song sounds like Amane is singing with her Trial 1 sprite, this one line is sung like her Trial 2 sprite. So:

Stuff your heart full with all your dearest dreams! Go for broke on all the things you wanna do! “We can’t stop” Is this a good feeling? Or is it no good after all?

Or translated for Amane:

"Follow your dreams of being a great follower and going to heaven!"

"Do all the things God tells you you should want to do!"

"We can't stop, can we? Even if it hurts, even if we are unhappy, we have to keep following that dream. Because horrible things will happen if we don't. And even if we try to change, then what was it all for? What did you hurt me for? There has to be a reason. Please tell me my suffering isn't meaningless. God will save us in the end if we keep doing this, right? That's the only thing I have left to hope for. We can't stop"

"Ehem- Doesn't it feel good?"

Or maybe I just like Amane angst a bit too much.

Anyways, that's the main takeaway from Positive Parade in my opinion. There is another way to read it, though, which I think is equally interesting. Mainly, that she might be singing it to herself, right before killing her mother. The "dreams" would be killing the mom, with the one more sinister "we can't stop" being there because it's a somewhat sinister dream. The "light in the dark" is a future without abuse I guess? The whole "rely on me" thing does come off as a bit weird, unless you go the "council of Amane" route and/or read it with the idea Amane has DID and then it just sounds like an alter, which would be something. "I won't support anything that denies you" and her mom did deny her... the issue there is that Amane also denies herself a lot of "vulgar" pleasures because Gozake ordainment. I don't think it works perfectly because of things like "I forbid you from pushing yourself too hard", but it's still a valid way to read the cover!

Anyways, hope you're not crying too hard! Take care!

[authoralexharvey]

INTERVIEW WITH A WRITEBLR — @jezifster

Who You Are:

Astro || He/him

I'm Astro, I'm a trans guy, I'm 24 and native American, I have ADHD and it's a dragon I'm either riding or fighting.

What You Write:

What genres do you write in? What age ranges do you write for?

Action, comedy, fantasy, paranormal, and romance. New adult.

What genre would you write in for the rest of your life, if you could? What about that genre appeals to you?

Romance probably. It's the constant in all my WIPs. I'm corny and I enjoy it, I love to see a couple (or a few) people trying to die for each other. That first kiss is one of my favorite scenes to write. I just love seeing what people in love will do for each other and to each other. It's cute, it's devastating, it's hot.

What genre/s will you not write unless you HAVE to? What about that genre turns you off?

High fantasy. I'm not into worldbuilding, so most of my stories are set in the real world with fantasy elements. I also don't think I could write royalty stories. I think they're neat, but I just much prefer the perspective of the grungy street rat.

Who is your target audience? Do you think anyone outside of that would get anything out of your works?

People who like violence and sex and drugs and anti-authoritarian themes. I think some people do read for my characters, without necessarily loving all the darker topics, and there's always a message that I think would resonate with everyone in my writing. Mainly that those in power don't give a f*ck about those under them and you should tear them down.

What kind of themes do you tend to focus on? What kinds of tropes? What about them appeals to you?

Anti-authoritarian is definitely a big one. Kill God, fight the government, question the system around you. Are monsters actually the monsters and don't heroes just uphold the status quo? I think I channel a lot of my feelings about the real world into my WIPs. I love a lot of tropes, especially the romance ones. Enemies to friends/lovers is so fun. Corruption arcs. ADHD x Autistic pairings is something that's so special to me.

What themes or tropes can you not stand? What about them turn you off?

The main one is the main character being too good of a person. I don't think it's bad, but I love when they get dark. Like yeah pull the trigger, the villain deserves it. Don't be upfront about your feelings and let them rot instead until you do something you regret. I think it's just way more interesting to read.

What are you currently working on? How long have you been working on it?

Bones and Bullet is my focus right now. I've been writing it off and on since I was 13 so I'm on year 11. I really like how it's turning out this time and I know more about the politics and espionage so plotting is a lot easier.

Why do you write? What keeps you writing?

I'm mad at the world and that's part of it. But mainly it's just a lot of fun. I have a blast watching my characters do wild stuff in my head, and I love entertaining others but I've always been the best at doing that through writing.

How long have you been writing? What do you think first drew you to it?

Since I was 8 or 9? I loved reading and I read The Lottery and felt so gut-punched by it I was like… I gotta do that to someone.

Where do you get your inspiration from? Is that how you got your inspiration for your current project? If not, where did the inspiration come from?

The state of the world is a big one. I don't think there's a god but if there is, then why are they letting things happen the way they are? I can make that character and actually ask. For my current project, I really liked action movies as a kid. Especially the really wild ones like the Mission Impossible series. Ghost Protocol where Tom Cruise is suction cupping outside the Burj Khalifa? That changed me. And then later I understood more about politics and the themes of songs like Born in The USA and I was like oh we're not the good guys, so my Agents aren't technically agents anymore, but exploited and discarded ex-agents who are permanently changed by what they went through.

What work of yours are you most proud of? Why?

Bones and Bullet for sure. I think the plot really works and I've always struggled with that, but I'm so excited for the climax of the first book. Plus Shadow and Veronica are characters that I really know very well and I think it shows.

Have you published anything? Do you want to?

No, I just post online. I don't want to do traditional publishing and I'd probably just make my finished project available online and printed independently if people wanted a hard copy.

What part of the publishing process most appeals to you? What part least appeals to you?

None of it appeals to me. Editors scare me, I struggle with constructive criticism, I do not think I could handle a negative review. So that's why I'd make my stuff available for free. Why would someone complain about something free? I would judge them for it instead of taking it personally.

What part of the writing process most appeals to you? What part is least appealing?

I love learning more about my characters. They really become so well fleshed out that they seem like their own people making their own decisions. I just manage the outside influences. The least appealing is the tedious. Keeping track of dates, or names of minor characters, worldbuilding a fantasy transportation system. I just much prefer the people part of it.

Do you have a writing process? Do you have an ideal setup? Do you write in pure chaos? Talk about your process a bit.

Oh it's pure chaos. I plan a lot of scenes while I'm driving in the car listening to music. I write random scenes on my phone, chapters on my laptop. I write when I'm overcome with the urge to, and I don't force it if I'm not. I usually write laying on the couch with my laptop or phone.

Your Thoughts on Writeblr:

How long have you been a writeblr? What inspired you to join the community?

I can't remember exactly but it's been over a year. I initially joined Wattpad but I didn't like some things I'd heard about it. And someone on there recommended tumblr. I've always liked tumblr but never was a part of the creative side.

Shout out some of your favorite writeblrs. How did you find them and what made you want to follow them?

I always follow people who have cool projects, and sometimes they follow me back and we start talking. It's a blast. I have a lot of favorites and I know I'm going to miss someone but @calicojackofficial, @vacantgodling, @multi-lefaiye, @addisons-damn-dialogue, @written-in-gold, @mrnauseam, and @kingkendrick7 are all super cool creators who are a lot of fun to talk to.

What is your favorite part about writeblr?

That you can do whatever you want here pretty much. It's not Twitter or tiktok and that's a good thing. It feels real.

What do you think writeblr could improve on? How do you think we can go about doing so?

I think there should be a way to engage more with readers. It's always nice to get feedback from other writers, but I know there are people who aren't writers but are mainly readers who would like to follow writblr projects who have no idea that's an option.

How do you contribute to the writeblr community? Do you think you could be doing more?

I try to read and reblog when I can. I like to participate in ask games. My dms and asks are always open for rambling at me about projects in. I would like to do more but my mental focus has been struggling lately due to life stuff so once I get that sorted out I'll be more reliable.

What kinds of posts do you most like to interact with?

Character posts are a lot of fun. I love seeing art and moodboards too. Ask games are a blast. Excerpts, of course.

What kind of posts do you most like to make?

I like to share the weirder lines I write as short excerpts. I also enjoy making ask games and full chapters.

Finally, anywhere else online we may be able to find you?

Discord in my pinned. I have an instagram and Twitter but I don't use them really.

Questions For Fun:

1. Got a favorite pairing, either in your work or in someone else's? What about it makes it your favorite?

What is the weirdest line you've wrote? What inspired it?

Some that come to the top of my head are Gwaine and Asher by @calicojackofficial , Hector and Ari by @written-in-gold and @addisonsdamndialogue, and Hya and Amon by @vacantgodling . All very fun couples with fantastic dynamics. It's hard to choose between my own pairings, but Shadow and Veronica have such a special place in my heart. They've known each other since childhood, fight a lot, know way too much about each other, act like they're divorced, but ultimately are incredibly loyal to each other. I have such a hard time deciding if I ship them more as friends or romantically.

"Oh, the sexy but fragile human body, boo hoo, you're hot, walk it off, have a potato, since you're so fond of them."

If your writing was a plant, what plant would it be and why?

It's a scene with Gabe and Satan from Rarely Reverie. Gabe is mad because Satan accidentally shot him. Satan is both flirting with him and annoyed that he's being blamed for it. They're just a lot of fun to write together because they're at odds a lot but have excellent chemistry.

Well I write a lot of stoner characters so I've got to say weed. Cannibis Sativa since there's a lot of action scenes.

[orchidsangel]

okay so i’m usually more of a silent follower (i’ve only like sent one ask ever) but i kinda love your posts/talks about things that you love (even if it’s not necessarily something i care about,,i just love it when people talk about their interests it’s amazing),, so i’m kinda curious about why do you think sos should have won over midnights,,, not saying that sos is bad or anything i actually love the album and sza but i was rooting for midnights honestly and personally think it deserves the title for many reasons,,, like i’m NOT saying that sos didn’t deserve to be aoty on the contrary, all the albums that were nominated are amazing and all had their big impact and the title is very subjective and ngl, this is one of those years where the nominees are all so good it’s actually quite a tough competition to choose between, but personally i found that midnights deserved it the most so i’m actually really curious to know your opinion on why sos should have gotten it

(i’ve already seen so much discourse about this for the past week on twitter but obviously. it’s twitter. so they don’t have any valable reasons except just pure hatred, misogyny, slut shaming and obviously racism)

Okay, so first off, thank you for sending in this ask and allowing me to speak about something I care about!! Second of all, when you added racism in the "don't have any valuable reasons section" what did you mean by that? I'm not coming for you or anything. I'm just curious if you meant racism towards Taylor or if you mean racism towards SZA.

anyways, now for my thoughts.

So, while I obviously agree that SOS is a great album, the part I disagree with is Midnights being a good album. I don't like it; I never did, and I probably never will. And this isn't me being a Taylor hater; I am a Taylor Swift enjoyer and have sat down and listened to a few of her albums. While none of them absolutely stunned me, I do think she's an overall good musician and can make a relatively good body of work. Midnights is a snoozefest. It's boring and doesn't hold a candle to the rest of her discography, which I feel fine saying because I know there are a significant amount of swifties and non-swifties alike that agree.

To me, midnights is nothing special, and most of the songs blend together. It's not completely bad, though; it has its good moments, but the many cons, i.e., boring instrumentals, mediocre lyrics, no super deep meanings, etc. outweigh the very few pros, i.e., Snow On The Beach ft. Lana Del Rey, but more importantly, Snow On The Beach ft. more Lana del Rey. And I just can't get behind Midnight's winning album of the year after being the pinnacle of mediocrity.

Now, if you wanna talk about impact, let's talk about impact. Midnights broke tons of records, most notably taking up all ten top spots on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, a feat that no other artist has managed to accomplish. But that wasn't because the album was good or because the general public was tuned in; it's because of streaming culture, because, like most fandoms these days, swifties are rabid and reaching for the charts. That, combined with the sheer size of Taylor Swift's fanbase, means that the album was bound to do well regardless of whether it was good or not.

SOS, on the other hand, obviously didn't chart nearly as well as midnights (although it definitely did chart, like, let's get that straight bc Snooze didn't leave the chart at all last year). But that doesn't automatically mean that it was less impactful, because charts aren't that reliable these days so you have to find other means of calculating impact, and this is when we turn to social media.

(I'll be using tiktok for reference as I feel that since the app relies on music as its #1 source of content, that's the best representation for my argument)

So I'm an avid TikTok user, chronically online, way too invested in drama that doesn't involve me, a loser, blah blah blah whatever, who cares. The point is that I spend enough time on TikTok to be able to observe many different trends going on at the same time and their musical origins. There are so. many. songs. on SOS that trended on tiktok. You could not escape SZA on that app, not even if you wanted to.

Kill Bill, Seek & Destroy, Low, Blind, Snooze, Ghost in the Machine, Shirt, I Hate U, Good Days, etc.

All songs that I've heard on TikTok at one point or another, some of them having their own designated trends to go along with certain lines, and I'm sure there's more I missed.

This specific point means so much to me because I need you to understand that I didn't listen to SOS in full until WAY into 2023 (the album came out in 2022 for reference), and each track was so familiar because I had already heard so many of them on TikTok.

Now, I'm not saying that there weren't any songs on midnights that trended on TikTok. Obviously, there were. i.e., Karma, bejeweled, Midnight Rain, that one part in The Great War, etc., but when I say that most of the songs from Midnights that trended on TikTok were pretty much always used in the context of Taylor Swift, I mean that. I cannot stress this enough. If there was a song from Midnights playing in the video, then I can guarantee that Taylor was being mentioned in that same video, whether it be the eras tour, speculation about her and Joe Alwyn's breakup, her and Travis Kelce, speculation about which Taylor's version album was coming out next, or literally anything pertaining to her at all.

You might think that this is a stupid point, but to me, it's a good example of the fact that it wasn't an album the general public was interested in. And I think for an award like Album of the Year at the Grammys, the album in question should be one that is either objectively good, incredibly poetic, and thoughtful with a deep message, or beloved by the general public, and midnights wasn't any of those.

As for the misogyny and slutshaming, I'd never in a million years agree with that and don't condone that by any means. Pure hatred, if unwarranted, isn't something I really care about either because I'm a hater at my core and have a lot of one-sided beef with people who don't know me. But I will say that most people I know who don't like Taylor Swift do actually have one or two valid reasons. It's not that hard to find them, what with white feminism, not using her platform for good, dating a known racist, and committing ecological warfare, amongst other things.

If the racism you're referring to is in regards to people bringing up her privilege as a white woman, and it bothers you that people are bringing it up, then I'm sorry, but I'm not the person you want to talk to about that because I won't agree. The Grammys have a history of snubbing black and POC artists in general to favor their white counterparts; in fact, the entire music industry has a history of it, and this situation isn't any different in my eyes.

Anyway, that's most of all I have to say. Thank you for asking again, I'd love to hear why you thought Midnights should have won.

[gleesongtournament]

Glee Song Tournament Update #1

I’m hoping to start the tournament on Sunday the 16th, but I will post a more concrete confirmation of the schedule once I get it 100% sorted

For now I wanted to talk about the songs that are included and excluded, and how I’ve set this up

What didn’t I included? Well the only two concrete answers were anything that was just a dance performance with the original song in the background (Single Ladies, Bubble Toes, etc), and any song that was album only with no filmed scene to go with it (Dancing On My Own, I Was Here, etc)

Some musical moments I left out might seem hypocritical. I left out songs by rival glee clubs that basically only served to show that yes, there is a third club competing, here’s ten seconds of their song (Broken Wings, Starlight Express, etc) but I included ten second snippets of songs from main characters (Respect, Mr. Cellophane, etc)

I also didn’t included (most) songs whose only purpose was to be bad or get cut off which unfortunately cuts out half the times Tina got to sing. Some exceptions are Crush (because we at least got a full studio version) and Pink Houses (which we heard enough of in the episode). But things like The Climb or Revolution will not be found here

Lastly, songs in deleted scenes. These were cut or kept in based on what I thought was more popular. I can understand someone being miffed if Santa Baby or I Want You Back wasn't included, but I doubt anyone would care as much about Oklahoma or Mr. Monotony (if you stan the latter two songs, I'm sorry). So I only kept in the ones I thought were more well known/liked

If you're upset about one of the above songs not being included, or think I'm not being fair, you should know that there will be 340 match ups consisting of 681 songs in round one alone. I only trimmed the tiniest amount of fat, and I promise there are still plenty of songs for you to vote on. But hopefully everyone can understand where I'm coming from and just accept what got cut x

Now, with hundreds and hundreds of songs in the mix, I wanted to do something a little more interesting than just throwing a million random match ups your way with no rhyme or reason. Bc 1) It could get boring and repetitive and 2) It could be harder to follow if it weren't split up in some cohesive way. That's where the categories come in

What are the categories? Generally speaking, they're the ways I've broken down the polls into themed sections. Hopefully this will make everything easier to follow, plus who doesn't love some good theming?? Specifically, the categories are...

Holiday Songs. All the Christmas songs + the one Hanukkah song. If you hate Christmas music, feel free to skip this round

Original Songs. Basically just any songs that aren't covers, whether it's the humorous or serious ones

Mash Ups. All the songs that are two songs combined

Same Songs. The songs that were covered multiple times on the show, pitted against one another. The only round that isn't matched up randomly

Tributes. Songs by artists/from musicals that the show frequently paid homage to (RHPS, WSS, Grease, Beatles, Britney, Fleetwood Mac, the Jackson fam, Madonna, Whitney, Stevie Wonder)(also the songs are from all eps, not just the one(s) that served as the actual tribute ep)

Musicals. Songs from musicals not listed in the last bullet point

Rivals. Songs performed by opposing glee clubs (The Warblers, Vocal Adrenaline, etc)

Guest Stars. Songs performed by, or heavily featuring, any of Glee's numerous celebrity cast members

New Directions. Songs performed by the main club. (Not necessarily a group number. Could be sung by half the club, or even two or three people, but as long as the rest of the club is there vibing, it counts)

Solos. Songs sung by one main or recurring character

Duets. Songs sung by two main or recurring characters

Misc. Everything else! Mostly trios, quartets, or group numbers that go beyond just ND

Of course there are plenty of songs that could fit into multiple categories. For example, "Somewhere" could fall under Tribute, Guest Star, and Duet, but will only be included in one of those. So if you think I left something out of a certain category, don't worry, you'll see it pop up in a different one later!

So I think that's all the basics so far. If you have any questions you can send them here or on my main @angelhummel

[popculturebuffet]

4th of July 2024 Special: An American Carol Review (Comission for WeirdKev27)

Happy forth all you happy people! It's that time of year again to fire up Le Grill, spend time with your loved ones and blow shit up constantly and for those of you who want some explodey boom boom pow sticks I have a friend who might be able to help you with that

For me though this fourth is a special occasoin: See for the last two years Kev has pitched reviewing An American Carol, a career destroying right wing comedy from David Zucker, the guy who co directed such classics as Airplane! and Naked Gun, and who became an old man yelling at clouds for being peace loving commies apparnetly and had this film not come out in 2008 , i'm sure it would've been stuffed with jokes about how "COMEDY IS DEADDDDDDDDDDDDD". I swear every time a comedian I respected says something like that I die a little on the inside.

So naturally I put this off as long as I could as it sounded bad and worst like something that'd give me maybe just a little to riff on but mostly a cloud of "that's not funny". I eventually caved as Kev.. is a good guy. He's paid for a LOT of reviews, helped me in tight spots, and a LOT of his ideas for projects were straight fire, like covering the blue beetle episodes of brave and the bold, the various duck retrospectives or most recently footing the bill so I could finally finish my life and times retrospective. So while he is also a greasy motherfucker for putting me through this movie and I will not let him live it down, I couldn't say no.

Good news, this film DOES give me a lot to talk about. It's not the xerox of a xerox of zucker I was expecting: i'ts a full on zucker film and I credit the about five jokes that worked to that style. The bad news... is this film is the worst movie i've ever seen and every moment of it was pain to sit through. And I fact checked that to make sure it wasn't just recency bias: I looked at the films i've seen on letterboxd, where I spent my early days marking down EVERY film i've seen. I thought about it against films I truly HATED and coudl've held the crown at one point: Anger Management, Are We There Yet?, Little Fockers, Let's Be Cops, License To Wed, Biodome, Scooby Doo Return to Zombie Island, Muppet Wizard of Oz, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, and MANNNY more I don't necessarily hate with a good chunk of my being but still aren't GOOD. All of these.. and none is as painful to watch, as execrutiating, as insulting as this film. This film is bad, Kev should feel bad, and David Zucker should feel godawful for making this film. Not for being conservative, I mean i'm not a huge fan of being conservative but it's his right, just for making a film this insulting, one sided, petty, gross.

An American Carol is one long dig at Micheal Moore portraying him as a slovenly egotistical asshole who no one likes because David Zucker has a hate boner for documentaries, while also shoving down your throat the message that

But without any of that charm and irony: it's just a long screed that says "well if you don't support the war the terrorists win" and makes up the argument liberals think the war in afghantistan was fake and the taliban isn't real which.. no... no we do not. We think the Iraq War was a mistake and done soley for Bush's ego and own agenda. It's like if you were trapped in a twitter argument with a conservative for an hour and couldn't just.. block his ass and move on with your day, you HAD to engage. It's like if one of my surlier conservative uncles wrote a movie. This film.. is terrible. It sucks dirty ass in thunderstorms. It is not good and what few good jokes it has are drowned out by his bullshit. If it were an ice cream flavor it would be pralines and dick. So unfortunately, we have ot break down WHY under the cut. And trust me if nothing else this film is FAR more batshit than you could ever fathom featuring patton's ghost mowing down the aclu who are zombies, songs on liberal indocrination, and Kevin McDonald playing with micheal moore's literal dead ass. Follow me under the cut. .you've been warned.

The movie follows Micheal Moore. For those who weren't around when he was a big name, Michael Moore is a doctumentary film maker, mostly known for being loud, bold and for getting huge success and acclaim for his 2004 documentary Farenheight 9/11, a documentary I haven't seen but now really want to, partly because it was a such a big deal even me, a children at the time, knew it existed so it's curious. And partly because it pissed off David Zucker SO badly he made this entire film as a rebuttal, and this film is such a pissy and petty attempt at a comeback I almost feel obligated to watch the thing that pissed him off out of pure spite.

Part of that spite comes out of how spiteful the film comes off towards Moore: The film depicts Moore as a documentary film maker with a massive ego who most of the world ignores because no one gives a shit about documentaries. Zucker comes off as REALLY fucking despising documentaries, taking every opportunity to make a joke about how no one watches them and no one likes documentary film makers and gives Moore a desire to break into features because of this. Now taking shots at how little america cares about documentaries? That's fine. It's added by the fact Moore DID want a best picture nomination and didn't get it, so I get trying to go that way.. but he instead does it so damn often, acting like fucking everyone hates documentaries and liberals only watch them because their teachers assign them, that I'm convinced David Zucker really just hates fucking documentaries and wanted to vent about it.

The problem is that he's using a real person to do this. Michael Malone's only diffrences from Moore is that he's a giant asshole, he's not married, and his films are all about hating america instead of systemic issues with it. By making your mouthpiece for what you hate about liberals "A real person but he sucks more because I hates him", it makes you come off like a whiny bitch who is mad this guy said mean things about the party you work for and thus is making every mean spirited joke you can.

Zucker spends the bulk of the film's run time taking shots at moore: His stand in can't get women, wants to direct a feature because no one likes documentaries, his only fans are liberals who are portrayed as sheepish assholes, and in the gag he repeats the most

Scott Steiner is less subtle with his fat jokes and he spent a good two minutes talking about the Dudley Boys FATTTTTT ASSSSSESSSS. The whole film has Moore eating constantly, being kinda gross with it and always obsessed with food. The fat shaming in this film is incredible. And i'm not against fat jokes: i'm chubby myself and if made in good enough faith or in bizzare enough instances they can work. But there's a line between "Making fat jokes because your fat or making them so cartooniishly nuts" and "a school yar bully picking on someone for being overweight" and this film is about 50% that.

Also just for the record: moore was married and had been since 1991 when the film came out and only divorced 5 years after this film, and is clearly just horny so Zucker can insert fanservice in slot b. As for the feature thing i'ts very clear Moore is happy doing them and got good success: Farenheight 9/11 was a MASSIVE success despite Micheal Esiner not wanting to release it and Moore and sex monster Harvey Weinstien having to reveal Touchstone was being petty about it. Moore was a known quantity and a minor celebrity. People knew who he was and saw his film. not every doc is going to be this big cultural thing but enough have been for him to come off as tone deaf. It's one thing to make a joke about something you know is true or distort it for the funny it's another to just.. lie for the whole film for a joke tha'ts nonexistent. Not only that MOORE MADE A FEATURE FILM. Canadian Bacon, a satire of the us and John Candy's last film. It didn't do well and he clearly decided he preferred documentaries. If you wanted to take a pot shot at him take a pot shot at him wanting an oscar because commercial success means nothing or something. When you start making up shit to make your point, you've already lost. Moore as far as I can tell at least tried backing up HIS points.

And you CAN make a statment with political comedy. John Oliver does it every week, 30 Rock once did a whole episode making a children's baseball team a metaphor for Iraq, and the Boondocks was full of clever satire, both of the rich that run the country and even of things most wouldn't tackle, like the massive hype train around obama that was overblown a bit. South Park makes a sport of it and while it dosen't ALWAYS work, some things like Douche and Turd hold up brilliantly. Doonesbury, one of my faviorite comic strips, does great satire. It may not be why i'm there (I love the large cast) but he weaves it in well using great character work.

Those shows though.. make an actual point. Oliver uses comedy to lighten the moon, the boondocks usually had a thesis for it's episodes and what it was targeting, south park always does. They think it out, make a point, while still making jokes along the way. Here it's clear Zucker didn't really think out his points or what his opponent had actually said. Gary Trudeau clearly thinks through his stuff, what who he's going after has done and gloms on it.

Zucker.. zucker just has the very broad point of "WE NEED TO FIGHT WAR BECAUSE TERRORISTS ARE A THREAT EVEN IF YOU BASTARDS DON'T THINK SO" and that Moore is HELPING them by objecting to the war.

He dosen't have any nuance to his take. The Zucker Brothers best comedies had some nuance: Airplane is a zany farce but there's an art to the joke. And while some of that art IS present here, it's drowned out by constantly trying to scream at the left and make conservatives feel better about their opinions. It's hard to enjoy Leslie Neilsen casually coming back from running after two people with a sword with blood on his blade when it's followed by General Patton killing a bunch of zombies from the ACLU who are demonized for... wanting to make sure we don't cross lines when torturing prisoners, imprison people indefinitely or by accident, or put the ten commandments in public court houses.

Yeah we'll come back to that, trust me, but you see my point: every bit of doofy absurdist glory.. is drowned out by a one sided argument with no empathy for the other side: Leftists in this film are portrayed as either attention seeking fuckwits, naive students, professors whose heads are still in the 60's, or literal zombies. They even dunk on George Clooney. First they have him played by Kevin Sorbo, then they imply they only cover topics that are "in the past" said topics are the nazis, mcathrisim, and racisim... all things that either still exist in some form (Racisim and Nazi Doctrune) or are still relevant as things like them still happen (Mcathrisim). The whole reason we have films covering the issues of the past... is because we keep repeating it. Trump plans to go after all his enmies if he wins again, is a white suprmacist and is extremley prejudiced. All of this is relevant and was at the time too: Racisim was still a thing in 2008, white supremacy existed. You can hopefully see at this point WHY watching this film is so agonizing: it's having a billgerent far right a hole scream in your ear for 93 minutes about how much you suck without being able to rebut because it's a movie, all while every point he makes is somehow dumber than the last and what points he does are drowned out by stupid, all while he calls you the biggest most naive son of a bitch who ever lived for daring to questoin war.

And the neccesity of war.. is the core of the film. Moorelone is hosting a "Ban 4th of July" rally. His nephew, whose in the military, objects to this when he finds out but was only coming to invite him to his fourth of july party. Moore is depectied as hating the troops.. which... is so factually inacurate, just going to the wikipedia page for Farenheit 9/11, something that took me all of a minute, shows Moore not only supports the troops but had the mother of a soldier who died in the doc and dedicated it to those who died in the september 11th attacks and the war.

Something the film dosen't grasp is you can hate war.. AND still be sympathetic to our troops. Our troops are not war mongering jackasses. Their, for the most part (As no group is perfect), well meaning people who want to help protect the country. Being military is something I can get behind. The comic strip doonesbury is what helped me get this view, and not only is it mostly liberal, it has tons of military as characters from one of the main cast BD who served from the Vietnam war to iraq before loosing a leg, to his best friend Ray, to Melissa, a vet overcoming the trauma of command rape and now a senator. Trudeau is liberal.. but isn't above showing opposing view points or showing the military.. as people. BD is a conservative, if thankfully the pre-trump kind, and a bit of an asshole, but his service is honored and the effects of coming home wounded on him are one of the series best character arcs.

People like me and Gary Trudeau objected to the war.. because it was for the wrong reasons. The Afghanistan war was just.. ineveitble. Al-Queda killed millions and were not going to stop and did it on us soil. We had to act. But Iraq.. is just bush using a horrible attack on our soil to justify a war he wanted his dad didn't finish. I'm not against proudly serving our country, but I am against an old man and the older man with a hand up his ass and thier various cronies sending those patroitc men and women to possibly die for a war that caused more problems than it solved. Afghanistan was necessary.. Iraq was the real problem.

Unsurprisingly, Zucker never brings up Iraq because it'd mean his argument would have to have "gasp" nuance! Oh the tribulation. His argument relies on the idea that the war on terror was necessary, but ignores the fact it could've been fought diffrent. That torture isn't necessary. That it's okay to not want a war against a country that was no threat to us (If still fucking awful), so civillians and our own military personnel don't die. It's something the right keeps horrifically forgetting: there are civilians. Civllians exist. It's how we got translators over there. War has a high bloody cost and has to be done only when necessary. I would LIKE for things to be settled peacefully, but in a world where most are out for their own self interest, that's not always an option. Sometimes war is a necessary evil.. but it's never a GOOD thing and it's okay to want it to end at some point. It's not okay to scream at people who don't want to just throw wave after wave of our own men at them.

So Kevin accidently walks into rock bottom as some comedy terrorists offer to bankroll his film and in this films eyes he's too stupid to realize the obvious. This terrorism subplot is tacked on as hell, both to hammer home the message that "terrorism is real" which

And opens the film with some antics the only one of which is funny is a workplace accident video about suicide bombing, which is such a dark concept it works. it's not the best, but it almost convinced me the film was good before it spent the next ten minutes screeching "GET IT I DON'T LIKE THAT MICHAEL MOORE GUY VERY MUCH. YA GET IT. YA GET IT YET. YA GET I DON'T LIKE MICHAEL MOORE"

The terrorists just feel kinda jammed into this movie, which is the feeling of a LOT of set pieces in this film. The film is trying to be a takeoff of a christmas carol.. but crams in a lot of shit besides it. Which in most films Zucker did worked. The plot was a thin framework to cram in jokes. Here this somehow has both too much plot, with the christmas carol a plot and the terroism b plot that crash together at the end that are only linked thematically, with tons of side trips and some ACLU zombie hunting. We'll circle back to that, trust me it's somehow even more nonsensical than it sounds. Yes that's possible.

So after half an hour in which micheal also meets with his agent whose played by James Woods who dosen't show up in the rest of the film for understandable reasons

And goes to an award show where he meets the terroists we get to his hotel room, where he idolizes Kennedy. The real Moore was an FDR fan, but at this point we can assume the only facts Zucker knew about Moore were "he's a liberal, I don't likes him, he's from michigan and

So John F Kennedy comes out of the screen to berate moore for forgetting the part of his "ask not what you can do" speech that advocated for war and decides he'll be visited over the next day or so by three spirits. Well in theory. In practice he's stalked by the Ghost of Patton for several days and the other two come in at the very end. Honestly.. you could've just done one. I woudln't of blamed you: while the three spirits thing is neat, if you just wanted one guy for both budget reasons and because he already fit as narrator, and because you could afford Kelsey Grammar more than you could John Voight or Country Music Man, there's no shame in that. There's a LOT of shame in this film, but simply wanting to do one spirit because the character fits the various scenarios better is fine by me.

So Moore spends the next day or so being haunted by Patton's ghost. He's played by Kelsey Grammar as I said, who dosen't really fit patton physically.. but he was conservative and agreed to be in this thing, so he was good enough and he DOES honestly give this film his best. Most of the acting is pretty meh and whoever they could get. Kelsey really is trying.. and that's with the fact he thought the film was too broad. The guy is fucked politically, but I give him credit for being one of the only two people who gave a shit.

Our lead... really dose'nt. Kevin Farley is the brother of chris farley and agreed to do this because "leading paycheck" and "he probably conservative." i'd assume. He is just .. loud. obnoxious and I don't fully blame him as he has nothing to work with, he dosen't do anything to convince me he'd be BETTER with less garbage material. Leslie Neilsen, likely doing a favor to and old friend and Kelsey Grammar kinda throw that into tier and Kelsey's role is crap, but he's at least trying as if the film wasn't and Nielsen is funny as always if not given enough to do.

So Patton takes Micheal to various set pieces, which i'll break down as we go as this is really just the film: Micheal goes to a set piece, ocasinally interacts with the b plot, goe sto another set piece. It FITS the formula of a christmas carol.. but also feels like that framework didn't fill the film enough so Zucker sticks in some random bs.

So we start with Malone at a war protest, with Malone declaring all war bad and advocating for peace talks, something that dosen't really work, but SHOULD be tried first. Patton takes him to see Neville Chamberlain... who is portrayed as a boot licking sycophant bending over to the nazi's who have plans to invade. All Kev had to do was show me Chamberlains' tv tropes page to call bullshit, all Zucker had to do to rethink this gag was go to wikipedia but at this point i'm not convinced he knew it existed and fi he did assumed it had some ancient curse that would turn him into a newt.

They also have Moore NOT KNOW WHAT A NAZI IS, as pointed out before but bears repearting. HE DOSEN'T KNOW WHAT A NAZI IS.

Patton takes him to see protests of world war II, using it because Pattonw as in that war.. and because Zucker dosen't want to use Vietnam, where we fucked up, or the Gulf War, which directly lead to the iraq war, so he uses the one where we yes, indeed HAD to fight because Hitler was indeed pure evil and a genocidal racist, homophobic, anti semetic and so many other things monster who was thankfully too dumb to actually win.

So when Micheal holds to his view no war is justified

Patton takes him to the present... where he now has slaves because the civil war never happened. SO we get a very UNCOMFORTABLE scene of David Alan Greir talking about how Micheal Moore rarely beats him. Slavery is bad, the civil war was necessary..

You also didn't have to embarss david alan grier with this bullshit. The guy did read the script I assume, but i'm sure he also assumed it'd get edited.. right.. right.. only to come to set dressed up as a slave and having to use a sterotype voice. Also Gary Coleman is here. He sure was here.

Patton next follows MIcheal to a campus rally claming they only watch his films because "their teachers told them too" and "he's the only liberal who can't get laid on a college campus"

He was popular and young idealistic liberals would eat that shit up. On the second part.. this film has weird obession with getting Michael Moore laid and i'm not here fo rit.

So it's here we get the indocrination song which has the biggest "i'm mad at my grandkids" energy of any musical number in film history. Seriously he , via Patton, accuses the college professors of having never left 1968, of brainwashing kids, and of "this is what their teaching your kids" instead of maybe that college is the first time a lot of young people get out of a conservative echo chamber. The internet's lessened that, thank god, but sometimes kids are opened up to the idea that maybe just maybe a lot of america's history sucks and the country is racist or that maybe we DIDN'T need an extra war to go with our war because Bush had daddy issues. I'm just.. so baffled by this "brainwashing" narrative when i'ts really just "your grandkids don't call because your an asshole pop pop" or "No dad, marrying a cat is not the same thing as two people of the same sex marrying each other"... that last one might've been just me. The song is catchy and COULD have had a point: that sometimes young people are a bit too gung ho in their actvisim and don't see the bigger picture. They often do, but sometimes when your a teen or in college, something i've gone through, you don't see the black and white of people's pollitics, why they might've voted that way. I've had many a conservative who were nothing but kind good people who just happened to vote for bush. Being conservative dosen't make you an asshole and sometimes it's easy not to see the shades of grey. Granted sometimes it also leaves you arguing with your dad over issues that feel obviously in your corner but they just can't accept, I may have issues, but sometimes people can disagree with you and not be a douchebag and that's hard to accept when some parts of the right are so fucking awful. It's a kind of empathy zucker wholly lacks in this film, the ablility to maybe see WHY liberals object to the war instead of

So we move on to an interview Moore has that day.. with bill o'reily.

Yeah sexual harasser, right wing asshole Bill O'Reily interviews Malone and Rosie O'Donnel... who is made into a 911 truther and nut. We get a way too fucking long sketch about her film where the christians are doing everything Al'Queda did GET IT BECAUSE TERRIOISTS ARE BOMBING. ALSO I ASSUME EVERY PERSON IN AFGHANISTAN IS IN AL'QUEDA BECAUSE I'M RACIST. When really O'Donnel is just really critical of the catholic church, pointing out their sex scandal and pointing out a lot of the supreme court is catholic. It's loud and reactionary.. but she's not wrong the catholic church is fucked up. Zucker is wrong to try and blame islam as a religion for a radical terrorist group, fuck him, which shoudl go without saying at this point but I need to say it to keep my sanity. If this review's been a bit more unhinged that's because every time I get a seconds respite in this flim, Zucker would throw out MORE bullshit that was obviously wrong but would then linger for several minutes.

Oh and as insult to injury O'reily says Moore is "more dangerous" because "People buy what he's selling".

So next Moore finds out their doing auditions for his film. The main terrorist...

Wants press passes he easily gets to bomb a Trace Adkins concert. If it sounds like the terroist film bombing plot is just kinda there.. it is. It absolutely is. It's just there to fill time and give us a climax when the climax.. should be Moore realizing the "error" of his ways. Again, flexible when it comes to a christmas carol adaptations, but come the fuck on. They gave you a pretty easy outline to follow and the runtime is not that long.

So Patton takes Moore to the past for the first time, to see what may of broke him. like a christmas carol he had a failed lost romance. Unlike it... it wasn't at all his fault. He left to go to college for a semester before dropping out, and came back to find his girlfriend dating his best friend and his best friend having joind the military. This is supposed to be why he hates war, but.. in that same flashback.. he already does. He already hated war, he already was on his way to being who he is now. It's just another chance to take pot shots at Moore's character by making him look like a looser.. which dosen't work because his girlfriend cheated on him with his best friend who in his eyes betrayed their ideals.

Next is christmas july present, which is July 4th, where every one of his nephews kids hates Moore for never helping them with their medical bills.. which is fair but again WE GET IT. YOUR VERSION OF MICHEAL MOORE IS AN ASSHOLE. It's also one of the few funny jokes in the film.

Speaking of which, in the background, Leslie Neilsen has been narrating this film... to these kids... who were there. one of whom is atticus schafer from the middle and steven universe.

The narration bits.. are entirely tacked on and feel like Zucker wanted to get more Leslie in there, but couldn't convince him to do any of the henious shit. We do get a really great bit where, when the aclu song happens, everyone in the wraparound pauses in confusion but otherwise it's just kinda there. Neilsen gets a better cameo they should've just stuck to playing himself having been cast for Moores movie, running after two actors with a saber and coming back with blood on it before saying he dosen't do documentaries. We needed more of Leslie but at the same time i'm greatful they kept his hands clean. If not his sword.

So then Patton bursts in with an army of soldiers. he gives moore a helmet and takes him to the courthouse to fight the "real enemy", the ACLU. The ACLU are zombies because Grammar begged for the scene to be rewritten so he wasn't mowing people down for their belivies. The ACLU's crime is wanting them not to torture terrorists, give them actual rights, and for taking down the ten commandments. Dennis Hopper shows up in his final fiml role to try and teach micheal moore war is fun.

I said all of that as plainly as I could.. so you could fully grasp what the fuck just happened. All the take that's in this film are bad, but this one is horrific. Saying the ACLU is bad.. because they wante people to have human rights and don't want cops to randomly search bags because someone is of color. Yes these are enemy combatants, but it dosen't give us the right to jack bauer them to get info or commit general war crimes, a lot of which did happen. And in general given all the good work the ACLU do and how much of it is helping people of color and queer people, it comes off mildly racist to peg them as monster sneeding to be put down. Also Patton shoots a terrioist he wasn't sure was one exploding them because Zucker apparently thinks it's okay to shoot someone if you THINk they've done something wrong or their the aclu. As for what this has to do with the plot

So Zucker took TIME out of the film to have patton mow down the ACLU because they dare to ask we not torture people.

The good news is we're almost free as this film is way shorter than it felt, not helped by me having to pause it a LOT to take in what shit i'd just witnessed.

So Patton hasn't reached Malone because none of his tactics make any sense and it's clear Malone is a selfish asshat so he fosts him on George Washington, whose there for a minute, talks about freedom and does nothing of consequences before being confronted by the angel of death, played by trace adkins who shows him the future.

It's here we get one of the film's most obnoxious sequence which in a normal film would be it's worst, but we just saw patton murder the aclu so , that bar is a bit high to clear. So Christopher McDonald is in this..

Along with Zachary Levi, which given later revelations is'nt super suprising. They are going through the remains of those who died and find Micheal Moore's ass. They then proceed to talk about how fat he is, use his hat to mock him and put his dead ass on

Michigan was nuked thanks to Moore and hollywood is now Osamaland and moore is praised as helping their cause

What do I even say at this point I haven't already? Objecting to war dosen't mean supporting terrorist groups!

So i'm almost free of this mummy's curse as Moore realizes terrosim is real, and after getting slapped by Patton, JFK and Bill O'Reily, who sadly isn't a ghost but just likes slapping Michael Moore. So he goes to his ralley where Jimmy Carter's somehow got us troops to surrender, don't ask, and Moore says turns out war is good for you ti's good for me, and gets rescued from the insuing angry mob by vetrans and taken to the Trace Adkins concert. He's informed by the two comedy terriroists their boss is going to bomb the place, they dont' want to die and Moore gets on stage and the film bungles the christmas carol thing as Moore, at least this version.. . isn't a bette rperson. he's still an ass he's just.. pro war now? He finds the terroist, he wins the day.

So Moore goes off to wish his nephew off.. and kill his children with slapstick because again, he hasn't changed. Zucker is so petty he can't do the one thing a christmas carol does best: have a person change for better. One of the most famous parts of it besides the three spirits, which you also botched. moore makes a biopic about jfk, and i'm thankfully free. FREE DAMN YOU FREE.

This film sucks. I try to see the good in most things I review: It's usually easy because I usually review good stuff, but even when ti's bad or mediocre I like to try and find what's good. All this film has.. is a few good gag. It's a hateful rant rejecing the idea not all wars are necessary, it's mildly racist, extremley stupid and EXTTTTTTREEEEMLLLLLLLY pety. And you know the funniest thing? the film... didn't provoke moore. When Jay Leno played a clip, one of the JFK bits not one of the most insulting things, he just brushed it off and said "I hope it was funny" That's it. Moore honestly didn't give a shit and if he saw the film, he never bothered to react. It's the best way to beat a bully a lot of the time: you don't give them the attention they clearly wanted. It's funnier than the whole movie: that Zucker spent an entire movie yelling in the man's ear and he just..ignored it. All of this.. was for nothing. And that at least.. makes me smile.

Thanks for reading, happy 4th and to all our men , women and nb's in the armed forces.. thank you for your service.

[amphiptere-art]

Stop you silly siren.

my best description.

So dear goodness how do I describe the lore. There isn't really one. It was just a fun section of drawings. Basically I think It was during some sketches of mer moon from Safe waves that went a little of course. I think it started as a drawing that I drew wrong. I've been decided to just kind of go with that wrong. Which developed into some craziness.

At first it was just moon. Then I drew a sketch of sun hanging upside down. While mer moon was laughing his head off. Of which the first little lines of dialogue we're written into life. Which also led to a lot of what the Lore is.

I continue to draw a little sketches. I drew a sketch of just sun. I drew a full body sketch of moon. Struggled with his human form for a couple of minutes. And I do remember drawing a single sketch of Captain Eclipse. Which is where's a lot of the lore actually came in. Not that it's much. But that's where a lot of it came from.

So past all those scribbles and into the lore. Like I said there's not much. It's more so an idea with little tidbits of information. Basically, first mate sun is Captain Eclipse's cousin or something similar. He basically is thrown into this situation because Captain Eclipse lost his whole crew or something like that. Eclipse losing his crew to moon. There was a siren that had been tormenting eclipse for a long time.

Animatronic seafarers aren't uncommon. This is a sort of fantasy world wear some automatons just kind of came to life one day I guess. I've never really thought of it. Just that there was a split between animatronics and humans. Also that there was a shortage of animatronic people. So Captain Eclipse's crew was made of mostly humans, that moon preyed on.

Which again comes back to the fact that that's why sun was there. Because they were worried about their grandpa. Who yes is supposed to be half blind. Or at least the robot equivalent of half blind. He's not really in bad shape otherwise, But he's an old animatronic that is starting to rust away and son doesn't want him to necessarily get cast out into the waters. So he joined hoping to get his grandpa to choose a different type of profession. Did not go that way and now he's gotten himself roped into the crew.

Moon is just a siren. He prays on humans and animatronic alike. Although humans of course give more sustenance. He found four pirate eclipses crew silly. It's not uncommon for a siren to pick a ship to kind of haunt. But moon found especially hilarious once he figured out Captain Eclipse was blind. Double hilarious after moons latest kill and they got their cousin's son involved. Who doesn't believe in anything the old cougar says. So he decided he was going to have a little bit more fun this time. Captain Eclipse wasn't getting any more human crew. So he figured he might as well become the crew. He'll just hunt any poor sod on the docks that Captain Eclipse sales near.

I do believe I did make some rules for the sirens call. Although they aren't my own. I'm pretty sure I took them from somebody else's AU. No idea what. I just know they aren't exactly mine. Basically animatronics fall asleep when they hear the siren song. While humans get lured overboard.

And that's when the shenanigans start happening. All sense of Laura just kind of fizzles out to have fun with random ass situations. It's also where the basic makeup comes from. Which of course I think I've described this a couple times. But the basic makeup is.

Captain Eclipse is old but knows the sea and also knows that moon is a siren. Son doesn't know anything about seafaring, and believes moon is just a normal human. Although he hates the siren even if it does not harm him. Mostly because it plays pranks. And Moon is a prankster siren, that is following around eclipse's boat and making it so he doesn't have any human crew. Wearing a human disguise to play pranks more efficiently.

That is of course the basics. I've added on now that moon basically became the navigator after a while. He was still a prankster but he decided He kind of liked these idiots. And sun was just so poorly and experienced that they weren't even really going anywhere. Eclipse's eyes couldn't see the stars and sun didn't know the stars. So he became their navigator just to get them moving.

There's slight undertones of siren Moon and Sun creating a relationship. But it's not exactly all the way there. Any sort of relationship they had was the more standard Sun and Moon brotherly than anything. Captain Eclipse was always thoughtfully very prideful and loud, but lovable Uncle figure. Son was about as shy as he always is but a little bit more angry. I almost want to describe it like papyrus. But instead of overly excitable it's shy.

And that's everything I can think of about stop you silly siren? Like I said there's not a lot of lore there's just a lot of information. Ideas that could be strong together into lore. I could open and ask series for them proper. But technically Blue Moon is already chilling out with them. So if you guys want to ask these guys questions, Go over there. They're around for questioning.

[bisluthq]

I think people also don't know or ignore how creative writing works. As someone who writes poetry as a way to get my feelings out, I'll be the first to tell you artists or creative people in general are all a bit crazy, a bit dramatic. Like we have big feelings and can be a bit dramatic about them. The feeling a song conveys doesn't have to be a super long drawn feeling ykim? Sometimes things aren't good in that moment and a song is a portrait of that moment that we need it to framed.

I wrote so many poems full on ugly crying and it makes you feel so much better after you get that feeling out. And after you get that out of you, you're able to think clearer and actually be like you know what maybe things aren't as bad as they seemed when I wrote this. You know what, I actually think if we do this or that this could be fixed.

Obviously I don't know their situation, but unlike swifties who think Taylor was held at gunpoint to make her stay more than a year absolutely unhappy, I think that whatever was going on she ended up by thinking they could still solve the situation. And for a while they probably did. If the problem was lack of attention or him being away from work, it seems like in 2022 they actually tried to spend more time together. He was just doing promo and not really being away for a long time.

And then for whatever reason things crashed again. Either because the og issues were just swept under the rug and not solved or something new came up

is it lack of understanding the creative process or a lack of life experience? I mean the former often strikes me as true with Swifties insisting all songs are play by plays and hyperrealistic and like almost form a storyline. They don’t lol even where they are truthful like I can all but guarantee when Taylor agreed to go out with lmfao Hiddles she wasn’t thinking he’s her getaway car - that’s how she came to think about it when it crashed and burned as fast as it did but like obviously that wasn’t her starting point?? Because she’s not insane?? But like that’s how she thought about it on reflection lol. Or taking songs like IWYW or Wildest Dreams or Stay Stay Stay or half of folkmore which she’s said are fantasies and/or very clearly are fantasies and plainly not believing her. That’s a lack of understanding the creative process.

a lot of how Swifties talk about her relationships - and especially this one with Joe - speaks to me to a lack of life experience (not meaning this negatively necessarily). My friend who set me up (in a roundabout way) with my bf is very regularly very miserable with her partner. In part because he doesn’t want to get married anymore. In part because he’s bad at communication. In part because they have different things that they enjoy tbh. In part because he makes decisions without talking to her. In part because he doesn’t get like set crew schedules and gets very annoyed with how her work life is structured. In part because he gets quite jealous idk. She tells me this stuff regularly but they stay together and they do have plenty of fun together - I’ve seen them having fun together with my own eyeballs and also she tells me tbh like they are clearly not happy every day but they’re also clearly not about to break up rn (my bf and I love both of them but we do think they will eventually) and idk guys lots of people are in similar situations? I’ve been in situations I stayed in because it didn’t suck every day? Every divorcing couple ever has stayed in stuff past the point of knowing it’s fucked? Like idk that’s part of life???? People don’t break up one morning just because like they realized yesterday they felt shit because there’s a good chance that morning you make coffee together and have a laugh about something and you just… stay. And you hope tomorrow is good again. And then when it isn’t and maybe it sucks then eh you hope for tomorrow all over again.

[astrabear]

15 questions, 15 tags

tagged by @ongreenergrasses. Not gonna tag 15 people, that's like 30% of all the people I follow.

Are you named after anyone? I have the name that my mother would have had, if my grandmother hadn't changed her mind at the last minute and given her a popular name instead. My mother always resented being one of many [name]s in her classes at school and was determined that if she had a daughter, she'd use this name.

When was the last time you cried? Man, I don't fuckin know. My dad died a year and a half ago, my stepfather died a few months ago, I've been unemployed and looking for work since December (just accepted an offer the other day, so that's cool), I visit my mom regularly and she's having a really hard time, and there was an ice storm a couple of weeks ago that left us without power for 36 hours and brought up a bunch of trauma from a debilitating storm two years ago. Also I have depression and anxiety. I can't be bothered to keep track of when or how often I cry, is what I'm saying. Sometime in the past week, probably.

Do you have kids? nope

Do you use sarcasm a lot? When joking with my roommate, yes. As part of general communication, I use it but I think not a lot?

What's the first thing you notice about people? Doesn't this depend on what's noticeable? Like if someone has blue hair, I'm gonna notice the blue hair first. Anything that stands out or seems unexpected - unusual hair color, tattoos, certain hair styles, size/height/other features that are at either end of the bell curve, dramatic clothes or accessories.

What's your eye color? Dark brown

Scary movies or happy endings? Happy endings, definitely.

Any special talents? I notice and remember stuff about people, and I connect pieces of information. Someone once described it as my superpower. This makes me very good at giving gifts. Sometimes I have to keep it to myself in order to not sound creepy (because people aren't necessarily prepared for you to remember something they said in passing a year ago, and then connect it to something that someone else mentioned last week, and use that to infer something they had not yet told you.) I'm also bizarrely good at finding specific Old Guard fanfics.

Where were you born? Houston, Texas

What are your hobbies? I have had so many hobbies that I no longer currently practice. I want to get back into cooking and baking (as hobbies rather than just necessity). I write. I play the Sims. For a while I was using the Sims to make fanvids, but that's fallen away as the writing has picked up. I'd like to start drawing again. It's going to take some time to get back in shape enough to do it, but I'd love to one day take up weightlifting again.

Do you have any pets? I have two cats, Truffle and Tristan. They will be turning 4 in a couple of months. I adopted them in 2019 and I can't imagine getting through lockdown without them. I made up these song lyrics about them, back when "Bad Guy" was still a thing: So he's a buff guy Not got lots of fluff guy Likes to play real rough guy Tail always so puffed guy She's that smart type Take my things apart type Face a work of art type Got a loving heart type They are good cats Duh

What sports do you play/have you played? None. The only physical endeavor that I've ever been serious about was weightlifting, but never competitively.

How tall are you? 5'3, 160cm. I'm basically a hobbit.

Favorite subject in school? In high school, English. In college, probably history.

Dream job? Alas, there is no job out there that would include doing complex work in spreadsheets and databases, and coaching/mentoring other people, and doing some kind of problem solving/information and referral work that gives people immediate assistance. When I did social service type jobs, I felt like I wasn't getting enough mental stimulation, and now that I'm working more analytical jobs I miss the satisfaction of helping people. Oh well.

Like I said, I'm not going to tag 15 people. But I will tag @lazaefair, because you're my most recent follow so I know you the least well.

For cat pics, see below

Truffle, my perfect angel baby:

And Tristan, my little goblin boy:

[spaceorphan18]

How do you feel about the Santana stans thoughts that Klaine should have known better and handled the situation better rather than singing her a duet? In Ikag of course

This is tricky, because how I feel about IKAG comes from an intense dislike of how the episode was written all the way around. I mean - it is my least favorite episode... by a lot. I think everything in S3 concerning Santana's coming out was terrible.

I think in a perfect narrative - Kurt and Blaine would have handled Santana differently? I feel like it's one of those things that Kurt may have tried to come at Santana on his own (Blaine's enthusiasm and positivity just is not where Santana's headspace would be -- and I can see how she'd be irritated by it).

I also think, just because they're all gay doesn't mean they all necessarily need to be involved. I'd have preferred them offering their support and then if Santana wanted or needed it she would have taken it. But, especially at that time, they aren't Santana's closest friends - nor do I think she needed to be accepting of them if she didn't want to be.

As for the song *sigh*. I like their duet. I like their duet in context of how they feel about each other and their own journey. I roll my eyes at the fact that the writers used it instead of them having a serious conversation with Santana.

But mostly - throughout the episode, the theme of the week is 'ladies week' and the songs are sung by men about problems women have to deal with (with the exception of IKAG which is its whole other irritation). And the whole concept is just a bad one. It reeks of -- let's let a man explain how to feel about being a lesbian/woman/etc. They had good intentions with it, but it was so much about Finn - and how Finn was dealing with Santana's coming out that it was all terrible.

And, unfortunately, the Klaine duet was another causality of the terrible writing.

So... yeah, I personally like the song, but not particularly in the context. And I get why Santana fans would be annoyed by it as a whole.